Chapter 1 · The forest of the exiled king · The divine births
Five Sons, Five Gods
King Pandu, cursed to die if he ever embraces his wives, cannot father children of his own. But Kunti holds a mantra that summons any god she names. She calls Dharma, and bears the truthful Yudhishthira; the wind god Vayu, and bears the mighty Bhima; Indra, and bears the peerless archer Arjuna. Her co-wife Madri calls the twin Ashvins and bears Nakula and Sahadeva.
Five brothers, born of five gods, each carrying his father's gift: righteousness, strength, skill, beauty, and quiet wisdom. Before them all Kunti carries a sixth secret, a son born earlier of the sun god and set adrift on a river.
KnowledgeWhy are the Pandavas fathered by gods?
Pandu's curse turns a royal succession problem into a theological one: his heirs must be divine by proxy. Each god's nature stamps the son, so the five brothers together embody a spectrum of virtues, and the war becomes, in part, a contest of what those virtues are worth when tested to destruction.
Source: Mahabharata, Adi Parva
Chapter 2 · Panchala and Indraprastha · The binding marriage
The Shared Queen
When Arjuna wins the fire-born Draupadi and Kunti's unwitting word makes her wife to all five brothers, an unusual marriage becomes the knot that holds the family together. Draupadi is queen, counselor, and the fierce conscience of the five, and her fate and theirs are now one.
Together they build the shining city of Indraprastha and, for a time, rule in splendor. But their very success feeds Duryodhana's envy, and the family's rise sets up its fall.
Figures in this chapter
Source: Mahabharata, Adi Parva
Chapter 3 · The forest and beyond · The strength of the second son
Bhima the Strong
Bhima, son of the wind, is the family's raw power and its appetite for life. In the forest the rakshasi Hidimbi falls in love with him, and their son Ghatotkacha, a giant master of illusions, will one day give his life in the war to draw out Karna's unstoppable spear.
It is Bhima who carries his brothers when they flee, who kills the tyrant Jarasandha in a fourteen-day wrestling match at Krishna's prompting, and who keeps every terrible vow he swears. Where Yudhishthira weighs and Arjuna aims, Bhima simply endures and breaks.
Figures in this chapter
Source: Mahabharata, Adi and Sabha Parvas
Chapter 4 · Kurukshetra · The friendship that wins the war
Arjuna and the God at His Side
Arjuna, son of Indra, is the greatest archer of the age, but his deepest bond is his friendship with Krishna, who marries his sister Subhadra to him and chooses to be his charioteer rather than lend his armies. When Arjuna's will collapses at the sight of his kin, it is to Arjuna that the Gita is spoken.
Their son Abhimanyu inherits the skill and dies for it, sixteen years old, in a formation he could enter but not leave. Through Abhimanyu's own son, Parikshit, the Pandava line will survive the war that kills almost everyone else.
Source: Mahabharata; Bhagavad Gita
Chapter 5 · The eve of war · The secret revealed too late
The Brother They Never Knew
The Pandavas' greatest enemy is their own eldest brother. Karna, born of Kunti and the sun god and cast adrift at birth, grows up scorned as a charioteer's son and finds his only welcome with Duryodhana, to whom he binds himself in loyalty unto death.
On the eve of the war Kunti tells him the truth, and Krishna offers him the throne itself if he will switch sides. He refuses both: he will not abandon the friend who honored him when no one else would. He asks only that his mother keep her five sons whatever happens, knowing he means to face Arjuna, and that one of them must die.
Figures in this chapter
A question for the traveler
Why does Karna refuse to join his own brothers when the truth is revealed?
Source: Mahabharata, Udyoga Parva
Chapter 6 · The Himalayas, toward heaven · The end
The Last Journey
Their war won and their years spent, the five brothers and Draupadi set out on foot for the mountains, walking toward heaven with a dog following behind. One by one they fall along the way, each for a hidden flaw, until only Yudhishthira and the faithful dog remain.
At the gate of heaven Yudhishthira refuses to enter without the dog, who proves to be his own divine father Dharma in disguise, testing him one final time. The eldest brother, truthful to the last, passes the test. The five sons of the gods and their fire-born queen pass out of the world together, as they lived.
Source: Mahabharata, Mahaprasthanika and Svargarohana Parvas
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